Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Well. Not really. Technically it is my 205th post. However, 5 of those posts are part of my header section. So I'm not counting those.

I thought that I would honor this, my 200th post, with 200 things about me. I started this about a week ago when I knew I was coming upon my 200th post and it's taken awhile to think up 200 things about me. Maybe all of this isn't totally interesting. But it's all 100% me.

My middle name is Julia

I chose the name for this blog, After 'I Do' because I wanted it to be more than a wedding blog, I wanted to talk about what happens AFTER the wedding.

Which, frankly, I think is much more important.

I was born in Illinois.

Right after my 10th birthday my family and I moved to Woodbury, MN.

It took me a very long time to call Woodbury home. But now I still think of it as my hometown.

Despite the fact that I haven't live in Woodbury since I was 20.

I went to part of elementary school, all of junior high and all of high school in Woodbury.

After graduation I moved to Winona, MN for my freshman year of college.

I didn't like it. I was homesick and hated dorm living.

So my second year of college I moved home and went to Century Community College.

After that year I moved to River Falls, WI and attending the U of W.

That's where I met Dustin. More on him later.

BEFORE Dustin I was in love twice and dated quite a bit.

I'm still friends with a few of my exes. In fact, I hang out with one of them a bit, as does Dustin.

I used to be the girl with some really close girlfriends.

We knew each other through junior high, high school, college and beyond.

And then one day we stopped being friends.

It hurt. A lot.

Now I'm the girl that has a few close friends and I finally learning to trust again.

I love animals.

That's why we have two cats and a dog.

The cats are Metro and Molly and the dog is Monte.

Monte is a toy poodle.

He's crazy. And adorable.

I've lived in 3 different houses, 1 dorm room and 6 different apartments.

And now Dustin and I are hoping to buy our first home in the next year.

That makes me feel very grown up.

And a little scared.

I've been on two cruises and LOVE them.

I definitely plan on going on more.

And my favorite country thus far is Jamaica.

I have had 6 different jobs.

They are JCPenney's (Mens Department and Catalog), receptionist at an insurance agency, barista in Borders Bookstore Cafe, team member at The Gap, hostess and then server at Perkins, barista at Caribou Coffee.

The worst job was definitely The Gap. I lasted all of a month there.

The best was probably Borders despite how horrible the management was.

I had a lot of fun there.

I've been with Caribou, my most recent job, for over 4 years.

I have naturally dark hair.

However, I've dyed it so often that I can't really remember what my natural color looks like.

My hair color has ranged from dark blond to black to red to pink to purple to blue.

I went through a wanna-be punk phase when I was 20.

Hence the strange hair colors.

My eyes are green.

They change colors sometimes.

I am 5'2.

When I was 19 I had a breast reduction.

I'd do it all over again too.

I would love to learn how to cook.

I fear that because I'm a picky eater than means I will never be a good cook.

I'd describe myself as an introverted extrovert who is a total homebody, a democrat (with republican tendancies), a dreamer (but one foot is on the ground) and someone who is very loyal to those I love. Mess with someone I care about and watch out.

I love my family. When I was younger it didn't always feel that way but now I am so grateful that they are my family and I wouldn't trade them for anything.

When I was a teenager I was one of those teenagers that stomped around, pouted, though that "nobody understood me" and more than once said I hated my family, my life, etc.

As a teenager I was a tad dramatic.

Actually, I'm still a tad dramatic now.

I love autumn.

September is my favorite month.

Not just because my birthday is in September.

Or because I got married in September.

But those are definitely part of it.

I love big funky jewelry.

And vintage looking clothes.

And winter coats.

I feel the best when I'm all dressed up.

Which is probably why I have multiple formal dresses hiding away at my parents' hour.

I loved my wedding.

But if I could do it all over again I would do it COMPLETELY different.

Because I am never satisfied.

I want to go to France, Italy, Ireland, Scotland, back to Jamaica, Greece, and so many other places.

I'd also love to go to Seattle, Boston, New York City, Vegas (but only because I'm curious), New Orleans, back to Virginia, back to D.C. and so many other places in the U.S.

I'd love nothing more than to sit in a coffeeshop all day typing up a novel on my computer.

And I wish every day that someday I will write a novel that will get published.

Although I hate long car rides I'd love to drive across the country. Just to say I did.

I have 3 tattoos.

My first tattoo is a butterfly with vines around it in the shape of a heart. It's on the small of my back.

My second tattoo are the words "Be Who You Are" with a star under them. That's on the front of my right ankle. The words are part of my favorite Dr. Seuss quote.

In case you DON'T know which quote, it's "Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind."

My third tattoo is my wedding date on the inside of my left wrist.

Dustin, one day, will get the same thing only bigger.

At one point I had 7 holes in my ears.

Which is funny because I didn't get my ears pierced for the first time until I was 11.

The 3rd holes that I get in my earlobes I got at my senior all night party in high school.

That really should not have seemed like a good idea.

I now have only 3 holes that are open - the first two I ever got and my cartiledge.

I'm not at all into sports. Except for my Minnesota Twins.

I love them.

Especially Joe Mauer.

I love to go to concerts. I never seem to have the money to go but the few I've been to I've loved.

I saw *N SYNC in concert four times.

Yes, I was a teeny bopper.

And to this day I will totally jam to *N SYNC in my car.

I used to have a crush on J.C. Chasez.

But now I'm all about Justin Timberlake.

I hate to shop but love to spend money.

I get really claustrophobic if a store is too full of people and have been known to leave even if there's something I really want to buy.

Pretty much my favorite thing ever is to have my favorite people over at my place, just sitting around hanging out.

I love candles.

I love candles so much that in high school I had them ALL OVER my bedroom.

Which is why there was a burn mark on the carpeting.

Actually, I think there may have been two.

I love Facebook.

Sometimes, though, I feel like Facebook is nothing but drama.

I will re-read a favorite book multiple times if I love it.

Some great re-reads include Why Girls Are Weird by Pamela Ribon, the Shopaholic series by Sophie Kinsella, The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown and The Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells.

I am a self proclaimed readaholic and have been my entire life.

When I was younger I went from series to series.

It started with The Babysitters Club. Then it moved on to Goosebumps. Then Fear Street. And then pretty much every Christopher Pike book.

Some day I want to have bookcases of all the books I've read.

I can't wait to have kids so I can read Harry Potter to them.

Speaking of kids, we want two.

Preferably a boy and then a girl.

Then again, we'd be happy with whatever we get.

We have a name picked out for a girl.

Esme Sophia.

We're still working on the boy's name although his middle name will be Wade.

Because Dustin's dad's name is Wade and Dustin's middle name is Wade.

From the time I was a little kid I used to get migraines.

I would get them quite often.

The older I got the less I got them but when I did get them they were HORRIBLE.

My mom once had to take me to the hospital because it was so bad.

I wouldn't wish migraines on my worst enemy.

When I was younger I loved to come up with "clubs" for my friends.

My best was probably The Earth Club.

I don't really remember much of what we did in The Earth Club aside from going around our neighborhood and in the woods to pick up trash.

But come on now, if we all pitched in a little this world would look pretty awesome, right? I used to think so.

I also had a club called The Fairy Club.

The Fairy Club basically involved my friends and me playing a game called Fairies at lunch.

As I got older, I kept my vivid imagination.

Hence the reason that when I was home alone as a teenager I swore that Hannibal Lecter lived in my basement.

Speaking of staying home alone as a teenager, I used to cause myself a mess of trouble.

And because of this, at my wedding my matron of honor totally threw me under the bus.

There was a night that my parents were gone and I had some friends over, which I wasn't supposed to (sorry Mom and Dad).

One thing led to another and I ended up shutting off the power to the large freezer that my parents had in our basement, thus defrosting and ruining everything in it.

I claimed I had no idea what happened.

I totally did know. Oops.

Remember how I mentioned I used to love reading the Fear Street books? It's because of those books that I think I have a fear of dying.

I was maybe 14 when I was reading one of those books and of course someone in the book died. It was then that I realized that someday I would die.

Although I know that A LOT of people have a fear of dying I will sometimes, at odd moments, be struck with the fact that one day I won't be here anymore. And that, as Chandler Bing from Friends would say, "scares the bejesus out of me."

I am a HUGE procrastinator.

Try as I might to get things done early, I always end up doing SOMETHING at the last minute.

At the same time, I feel that I do some of my best work under pressure.

In school I find that I could spend lots of time on a paper and get a worse grade than on a paper that I was up doing the night before till all hours of the night.

Scratch that. I would never stay up till all hours of the night to do a paper. I value my sleep way too much.

I talk way too much sometimes.

And way too loud.

I'm that person that has no idea how loud I am so sometimes I embarrass myself with my loud voice.

I pretend I don't care about that.

But usually I do.

I've been told that I have a unique laugh.

In high school some people knew me simply because of my laugh.

I used to want to be a "famous singer" when I "grew up."

Until I realizes I can't really sing.

From there I went on to want to become a journalist, a psychologist, something having to do with marketing and a social studies teacher.

I still am not entirely sure what I want to be when I "grow up."

In all honestly if I could be ANYTHING I'd be a published author.

When I was younger I decided that if I did become a published author I wanted to be published under a different name.

I have no idea why. Because nowadays I'd totally be published under my own name.

Because wouldn't that be cool to be in a bookstore and see YOUR books with YOUR name on them?

I am very sarcastic.

To the point where sometimes I wonder if people realize I'm kidding.

At the same time, if you push me too far with your jokes I will get mad.

I have a horrible temper. I'm quick to get angry and quick to blow up.

But in about ten minutes I cool off.

I'm also quick to forgive.

But sometimes I wait just a smidge too long.

I have never broken a bone.

I've never had the chicken pox.

I'm left handed.

But I use scissors with my right hand.

I believe in ghosts.

And aliens.

And God.

But I don't go to church.

Because I've always felt that I don't need to go to a building or believe in one certain religion to prove my faith in God.

I hate snow. A lot.

I hate snow because it's cold and wet and it's hard to drive in.

I only thought of saying that because it snowed like crazy yesterday and today.

The only reason I like snow is because it looks pretty when it's Christmas.

I've kept journals almost all my life.

I still have every journal I've ever written in.

They're stored in a box somewhere.

I like to take them out every now and again and try to remember the girl I used to be.

Sometimes it feels as if someone completely different wrote them.

When Dustin and I first met we texted all the time.

I actually got into trouble because of all the texts I sent (at the time texts were not free on my phone plan).

I was so comfortable TEXTING Dustin but I was SO nervous with him in person.

That changed really fast. And then we became good friends.

I always said I wanted to fall in love with someone that I was friends with first.

i agree with you about after the wedding being more important that the wedding. i think a lot of people get caught up in the wedding and forget that the day after, you're stuck w/ a marriage, so hopefully you picked the right person :).

AWESOME! Another Badger Blogger!! While we're in the DC area, Hubz is from Chippewa Falls and both our girls go to college in your fine state...Listen, I also wanted to thank you soooooooo much for stop­ping by on my Spe­cial SITS Day. It’s taken me a while to get back, but I hope to see you around the blo­gos­phere again soon!